The prompt for this column has TMI (too much information) written all over it. I underwent surgery this past week and should stop right there. Instead, I proceed with tact and restraint.
Modern medicine is easily under-appreciated until the need arises for modern medicine. The need arose for me, which led to a conversation with my doctor, which led to a conversation with a surgeon, which led to a date for surgery, which led to a lengthy list of pre-op do’s and don’ts and to a thorough line-by-line review of my complete medical history over the phone.
After no food and only clear liquids 24 hours ahead of surgery, I arrived at the appointed time to surrender myself to the medical authorities. Within minutes I was comfortably lying on a gurney, behind a privacy curtain, in a Johnny, under a “fresh from the oven” cotton blanket, and the sudden recipient of numerous kindly check-in visits from young, competent, courteous medical professionals.
I had been telling myself this would be minor surgery — a hernia repair — but soon realized there is no such thing as minor surgery. There are too many careful steps taken, too many well-trained people involved, too many medications required, too many medical procedures observed, for any surgery to be considered minor.
I know how lucky I am. I know such medical care is unavailable to the majority of people on Earth. Modern medicine is amazing, but also amazingly expensive. Is that the main reason why everyone on Earth is not receiving good medical care? It is no doubt more complicated than that, but not at all complicated to say it is unfair.
Healing happens is many ways, as there are many ways that things do go sideways. As an Episcopal priest, much like the horse whisperer, my craft is to find old and fresh ways to teach the quietly despairing, the broken-hearted, and the disillusioned — or each of us unavoidably at one point in our lives — a truer story about ourselves than the one we have come to believe.
Such healing, like all types of surgery, is never minor, but truly significant, life-changing, and made possible by those whose competence reflects years of dedication and care, study and practice.
Modern medicine has done an amazing job to return me to a more original version of myself than when a hernia arrived to limit my narrative. Upon recovery, I expect to return to my story and continue to find fresh ways to lead people back to that truer story about themselves, helping them to become, once again, who they are — brave, generous, tender-hearted, children of God, living with humor and grace.
The Rev. Bradford Clark is the rector of Ascension Memorial Church in Ipswich.